By Irfan Iqbal Gheta
Chief Minister Nitish Babu’s Bihar is a Dry State. Consumption of alcohol is a criminal offence in Bihar. The Internet is always hungry for some out-of-the-box mistakes from celebrities and commoners alike. When these innovative or first-of-its-kind mistakes surface, creative minds get to work and start dishing out memes.
The next day, we read about these memes in our national dailies. A such and such thing happened in a such and such place, inspiring a hilarious meme fest on X – formerly Twitter. Here are a few rib-tickling examples.
Does it sound familiar? The latest example that comes to mind is Virat Kohli liking a picture of an up-and-coming actor on IG and then issuing a clarification in which the phrase, “Algorithm registered an interaction while clearing my feed”, inspired a hilarious meme fest across social media platforms.
Let us return to Bihar now. The occasion was National Fish Farmers Day on Thursday at Supaul. Neeraj Kumar Singh – Minister for Public Health and Engineering – and Sawan Kumar – District Magistrate – along with other dignitaries, were in attendance.
Shambhu Kumar – District Fisheries Officer – stole the thunder in this high-profile event with his antics that could have triggered a hilarious meme fest.
As per reports across national dailies, Sawan Kumar, District Magistrate, received complaints about irregularities in the distribution of fisheries kits. He began to investigate the matter with Shambhu Kumar, District Fisheries Officer, whose speech was slurring and whose behaviour was erratic. The DM grew suspicious and ordered a breath analyser test on Shambhu Kumar. The alcohol test revealed that Shambhu Kumar was under the influence of alcohol.
This is not the end. This is just the beginning. Shambhu Kumar turned out to be a habitual offender. Back in 2024, he was caught red-handed in a similar condition. As per a court order, he paid a fine between ₹2K and ₹5K and, for being a first-time offender, got off back then.
Be that as it may, the power-packed knock-out punch – that could have inspired a hilarious meme fest – comes now. The accused District Fisheries Officer kept denying that he was under the influence of alcohol. To defend the indefensible, he gave a bizarre story. He was unwell and taking some homoeopathic medicines that smelled like banned alcohol.
Needless to say, the District Magistrate was not amused. He would have none of it. He sent Shambhu Kumar packing behind bars for showing up “in an inebriated condition” at a state-sponsored high-profile function with a minister as one of the dignitaries.
Moral of the story?
Often repeated creative excuses run their course one fine day and land the too-clever-by-half people behind bars. The best option is to stay sober and avoid all this trouble.
